Minor league baseball just as fun as the show

Tuesday

Jul 16, 2013 at 12:01 AMJul 16, 2013 at 11:02 PM

Erich Murphy's weekly Sez MEE column

Erich Murphy

In perusing the Internet the other day, I decided to take a look at some of the minor leagues to see how teams I used to follow were doing. Not all the teams I used to go see are still in existence, but most of the communities are still providing professional baseball in the sticks. As a kid I went to a lot of games in Burlington, Ia., with my dad. As a grad student at the University of South Carolina, I went to some games in Columbia. One summer — 1992 — I covered as much of the Midwest League as possible. George Spelius, the president of the league, provided me with a pass for all the parks. Among the many things that made going to games fun back then was enjoying the atmosphere and the economical cost of watching professional baseball. Probably the biggest thing now about going to those games is remembering who played Class A ball and eventually made it to the Majors. My dad took me to my first minor league game. The Bees were affiliated with the Oakland Athletics at the time. Frankly, I thought Burlington was called “B’s” because it was a farm team for the “A’s”. The two Athletics I saw that made it big were Chet Lemon and Claudell Washington. Lemon became a star with the White Sox. Milwaukee became the parent club of Burlington in 1975 and two years later I was able to see my first hall of famer play minor league ball. I had seen the likes of Ernie Banks, Billy Williams, Ron Santo, Bob Gibson and Joe Torre play in the big leagues, but Paul Molitor was the first player I saw just getting started who eventually made it all the way to Cooperstown. Molitor played a little more than half a season at Burlington in 1977 and began the next year in Milwaukee with the Brewers. As is the case with minor league clubs, affiliations change with some regularity. I saw Burlington as an affiliate of Oakland, Milwaukee, Texas, Montreal, Atlanta and Houston. Among the players I saw were Larry Walker, Ruben Sierra, Jose Vidro, Urgueth Urbina and Javy Lopez. Peoria got a franchise in 1983 and was affiliated with the California Angels. Then known as the Suns, the Chiefs featured Wally Joyner and Devon White on that first team. I did not see the Chiefs until they became part of the Cubs’ organization in 1985. I did see Greg Mattox and Rafael Palmeiro that first year. The following season had Mark Grace and Joe Girardi. There were a lot of players who donned the Chiefs’ uniform before making it to the Majors. Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina played in Peoria before getting the call from St. Louis. My covering of the Midwest League involved doing a weekly column with interviews of the managers for Burlington, Peoria, the Quad Cities team and Springfield. It was a time when the Cardinals had a Class A team in the state capital. That Springfield team in 1992 included John Mabry and Dmitri Young. I remember asking Rick Colbert, the team’s manager, who stood the best chance of making the bigs. He said that Mabry and Young were the only two the parent club expected to make it to the top level. Baseball is so much different than the other major league sports in that fans can go see minor league baseball and the big leaguers of the future getting their start, or they can see players from the bigs in some rehab games at whatever level. There is no real minor league football that feeds into the NFL and minor league basketball is something of a joke. Only hockey comes close with the minor league system that includes the IHL. You can’t be fun at the ol’ ballpark, whether it’s at Wrigley Field in Chicago, Busch Stadium in St. Louis or O’Brien Field in Peoria. A relaxing evening watching baseball is a good thing, no matter what level the game.